Last Updated: 21st October 2024
1. Introduction
BAFTA has always believed in being open about what data we collect from our members and what we do with it. The UK GDPR sets out comprehensive requirements for handling personal data. This includes a number of things we must tell you of when we collect data from you. We have provided all the information you need as simply and clearly as possible through this Privacy Policy using a question-and-answer format.
2. What data will be collected about me and why?
We collect various types of data, all of which we need in order to initially process your membership application and then to maintain your membership as such this means that the lawful basis for processing your data is Article 6(1)(b) of the UK GDPR: “processing is necessary for the performance of a contract to which the data subject is party or in order to take steps at the request of the data subject prior to entering into a contract”.
The types of data and the reasons for collecting them are detailed below:
2.1. Expertise and Experience
We collect information about your professional expertise and experience. In the first instance this is used to assess your eligibility for membership. If your membership application is successful we retain this information so that we can identify members who might be suitable to participate in BAFTA initiatives and to assess your voting eligibility on an ongoing basis. We also use this data to ensure that our membership as a whole reflects the film, games, and television industries that they represent.
2.2. Address and Other Contact Details
We collect address and other contact details so that we can send you letters and emails to do with the administration of your membership (renewal notices, membership cards, voting communications etc).
The regular newsletter is an important mechanism for keeping members up-to-date with BAFTA news, including the business and charitable activity of the Academy, voting reminders, renewal notices, and other important membership administration. Events and offers promoted in the newsletter are made available exclusively to members by BAFTA and select partners. We will use your email contact details to send you the weekly newsletter. You can opt-out at any time by clicking the ‘unsubscribe’ link at the bottom of the email.
Depending on your voting rights and only if you have opted-in to receiving them, you may be eligible to receive invitations to screenings and events from studios and distributors. If this is the case we will pass your email address to participating studios and distributors so that they can send you invitations.
2.3. Membership Survey Data
We want to promote an inclusive industry where anyone with talent can thrive. An important part of this is getting the most accurate picture that we can of who our members are, to inform our research, celebrate our strengths, and identify areas for improvement. To enable this we conduct a survey of our global membership so we know exactly where we currently stand and so that we can be as transparent as possible about progress towards our goals.
This survey includes sensitive information about ethnic origin, sexuality and disability. The security and privacy of this information is incredibly important to us. The answers you provide will be stored completely separately to your membership record. Although we require all members to respond to the survey, we will only use the data we collect to compile aggregate statistics and never to make any decisions relating to individual members. All changes announced in the Awards Review are being made in the spirit of inclusion; we will not make any changes to your membership based on your response to the survey.
The data you provide will inform reporting on the demographic makeup of the membership overall, and of smaller groups such as voters in individual awards, voting chapters, or geographical regions. Access to the data is restricted to a handful of senior staff in BAFTA’s London office and a log tracks each time the data is accessed and for what reason. Additionally, your responses to the survey are encrypted and processed with an even higher level of security than we use for BAFTA Awards results.
2.4. Payment Details
We collect payment details (either direct debit or credit card) so that we can process your membership subscription fees. If you have opted to pay by direct debit then we will store your bank details so that we can collect payment.
2.5. Your Interaction With BAFTA
We record details of your interactions with BAFTA such as:
We may make a record of discussions we have with you over the phone so that we can provide a consistent and efficient service if you call again.
We record your voting activity so that we can identify which members are, or are not, engaging with the voting process as required by the membership rules.
We may record your attendance at BAFTA screenings. If you have booked tickets and then fail to attend this will also be recorded so that we can impose sanctions on any members who are consistent no-shows.
We record your attendance at our members’ club to help us understand how members use this important membership benefit. This data is also used to help us tailor the services we offer to meet our members’ needs.
2.6. Website Analytics
In common with most other websites we use website analytics software which collects data about how people use our website. However, this is anonymised and cannot be traced back to you. We use this to help make sure our web servers are working well and to see which parts of our websites are most/least popular. This helps us to improve the overall user experience.
2.7. Complaints and Behaviour
As mentioned in the Data Code section of the BAFTA Membership Codes, we will collect and process personal data for the purpose of handling complaints made to BAFTA about any of its members. This data will be stored with additional security safeguards and will be accessible to just a small number of staff with responsibility for handling complaints.
3. Who is responsible for my data?
Any data collected about you on any of the BAFTA web sites will be kept under BAFTA’s control.
BAFTA’s activities in America are carried out by BAFTA’s branches in New York ( British Academy of Film and Television Arts, East Coast, Inc.) and LA (The British Academy of Film and Television Arts L.A. Inc). BAFTA LA and BAFTA NY work together with BAFTA in the UK to enable BAFTA to operate as a global organisation. To facilitate this, BAFTA and the US branches share the same central membership database.
The central database and the other service providers referenced in this document are managed by BAFTA and shared with the US branches. All queries relating to the handling of membership data should therefore be directed in the first instance to BAFTA UK who will forward these on to relevant US branch if necessary.
BAFTA is registered charity (No. 216726) and can be contacted using the following details:
Postal:
The Data Controller
BAFTA
195 Piccadilly
W1J 9LN
Email: [email protected]
4. How long will you keep my data for?
4.1. Records of Your Membership
We will retain the following key details of your membership indefinitely for our records and to answer queries from others about historical membership details:
- Your name
- The start and end dates of your membership
- Your membership type, branch location and voting rights
- Your employer and job title when you were a member
- Payment Data
If you pay for your membership by credit or debit card, your card details will not be stored and will need to be entered into the website or provided over the phone each time you make a payment. If you pay for your membership by Direct Debit your bank details will be securely stored as long as your membership and Direct Debit instruction are active.
4.2. Complaints and Behaviour
The policy for retaining data relating to complaints about BAFTA members is laid out in the Data Codes section of the BAFTA Membership Codes which can be found in the “Information -> Academy Business“ section of the members’ area of the BAFTA website. We retain this data for as long as you remain a member. The Membership Codes may be reviewed from time to time so you should check the current membership codes to be sure of the current retention policy.
4.3. Membership Survey Data
Your responses to the membership survey will be retained for as long as you are a BAFTA member. If you cease to be a member then your survey responses will be anonymised within 6 months of your membership ending. After this it will be impossible to link the survey response back to you.
4.4. All Other Data
All other data we hold about you will only be kept whilst you remain a member and for up to 14 months after your membership lapses – this allows us to renew lapsed memberships in certain special circumstances up to a year after the membership lapses without the member having to go through the full application process.
5. Where will my data be stored?
Your data will be stored on BAFTA’s own internal systems in our headquarters in London.
Some of your data will also be stored on BAFTA’s web servers (hosted in Dublin by Amazon Web Services) so that it is accessible to you through the members’ area of the website. For information about the security of your data in the AWS cloud check out these links:
We also use cloud based services to store and process data about members. Some of these cloud providers store data in the United States. In these cases we have reviewed the security and legal privacy safeguards put in place by each service provider. In addition to this, our contracts with these providers include clauses which guarantee that they provide the same safeguards for the data and rights to our members as if the data were stored in the EU. More information about the security measures put in place by these providers is provided in the links below.
We may choose to use other service providers in future, if we do they will be bound by the same strict rules which guarantee that the same safeguards are in place, and your rights remain the same. If we change our service providers then we will update the details on this page so you can always return to this page to see where your data is being stored.
Here is a list of the current cloud based service providers we share members’ data with:
5.1. SalesForce.com
What data: All data collected about members is stored in SalesForce
Purpose: Managing our membership database
Data location: USA
5.2. MailChimp.com
What data: Just name and email address
Purpose: Keeping in touch with members via email
Data location: USA
6. Who will have access to my data?
Staff within BAFTA whose duties require it will have access to our database of members. This includes staff in the Scotland and Wales branch offices and also BAFTA North America (see “Who is responsible for my data” above for more information about BAFTA’s US branches). These branch offices have access to the member database in order to be able to support visiting members from other locations.
We use a web agency to develop our web sites. This agency has access to the servers which hold the data so that they can maintain the servers – this also gives this agency access to the data. Our contracts with this agency ensures that they treat all of our members’ data in strictest confidence.
Some technical tasks, such as configuring and securing our servers, require specialist expertise. We use specialist UK-based contractors to provide these services. These contractors are carefully vetted. All contractors must sign non-disclosure agreements which include a requirement that they keep all BAFTA’s data confidential.
If you have voting rights then your details may also be passed on to studios or distributors as outlined below (see “Will you give my data to anyone else?”).
Your name and profile (if you have provided one) will be visible to other BAFTA members through the “Membership Directory” section of the BAFTA members’ area. This will also show your career summary and social media links if you have provided this. Your email address and phone number can be shown or withheld in the member directory as you wish by choosing the appropriate options in the “Directory Settings” section of the members’ area of the website.
7. Will you give my data to anyone else?
Studios and distributors are permitted to send members some very carefully controlled emails to promote their BAFTA entries. Members are obliged to keep themselves informed about the films that have been entered for awards which fall within their areas of expertise. These emails are an important mechanism for doing this. Only your name and email address is shared and only when the entry being promoted is relevant to one of your areas of expertise. Any organisation requesting access to members’ details must sign a non disclosure agreement and is bound to protect the data in their charge, keep it confidential and use it only for the purposes for which it has been supplied to them.
Depending on your voting rights, you may be able to watch entries for BAFTA awards online through BAFTA View. Whilst most of the voting system is managed by BAFTA, the video playback is handled by a variety of systems belonging to the various studios and distributors. Each time you watch a video, your BAFTA Membership number will be passed to the online video streaming platform used by the studio/distributor that has entered the title you have clicked to watch. The video streaming platform may use this to create a visible, or invisible watermark in the video you are watching to make the video unique to you. If the studio is later able to demonstrate to BAFTA that the unique video provided to you has been used in any way which contravenes the studio’s terms and conditions displayed to you at the point you watched the video, then we will share your name, email address and postal address with the studio for the purposes of investigating any abuse.
In some cases the online viewing platforms used by the distributors require additional authentication by sending a one-time code either by SMS or by email. In these cases we will pass your email address or mobile number to the video streaming platform as required, but only at the point you click to watch that specific content.
BAFTA have special arrangements in place with leading trade journals to provide free copies to our members in order to keep them up to date on industry news. Depending on your location and voting rights we may pass your name and address details to relevant trade journals so that they can send you these free copies.
We will also pass your details to law enforcement agencies if we are required to do so by law.
We will not pass on or sell your details to anyone else.
9. What rights does GDPR give me?
Here is a summary of the main provisions of the UK GDPR which are relevant to the type of data we hold about you:
Access: You have the right to view the data we hold about you and to receive copies of this data in digital format.
Accuracy / Rectification: If any of the data we hold about you is incorrect or incomplete then you can provide the correct or complete data and we must update the data we hold.
Erasure: You can request that we erase all the data we hold about you, but this is only available in some situations.
Restriction of processing: In some cases you can ask us to retain your data but not do anything with it.
10. How do I exercise my GDPR rights?
If you want to exercise any of your rights in relation to data BAFTA holds about you then please email: [email protected] or write to the Data Controller at the address given above (see “Who is responsible for my data?”)
Please provide details in your email/letter of what actions you would like us to take. Depending on the nature of the request and whether or not your request comes from the email address we have on file for you, we may need to verify your identity so that we don’t give out information to the wrong person, or delete the wrong person’s information. In most cases it helps if you are able to provide a contact phone number so that we can validate your identify and discuss the request with you.
11. What if I have a complaint?
If you are concerned about how we manage your data, or how we have handled a request to exercise your rights, then please get in touch with us to discuss it. To do this please send an email detailing your concerns to [email protected].
If you are still not satisfied with the response you can take your concern to the Information Commissioner’s Office. For details of how to do this please refer to the ICO web site: